Using the master's tools: How the law reshapes gender boundaries in the public-private sphere

Abstract

According to an old stance, very popular among second-wave feminists, 'you cannot use the Master's tools to dismantle the Master's house'. In other words, you cannot change structural gender inequalities by enforcing the rules that 'the Master' put in place; you will only be reifying patriarchy. This article aims to prove that patriarchy can be beat in its own game. Through extensive legislative changes occurring in the past four decades in developed nations, the status of women has improved dramatically. Specific examples in key areas illustrate that social awareness of problems such as domestic violence, abortion, and women's employment rights have gone hand in hand with legal regulation. The developing world is also on the path to formal equality, with educated women spearheading change and effecting social progress with their valuable human capital. The law has provided powerful tools, establishing new models of behavior for men and women in both the private and the public sphere. Once these spheres were distinct and separate; today they have meshed together, their boundaries effaced, changing women's lives regardless of ethnicity or culture.